Wireless devices are increasingly used for location based discovery and services. Wi-Fi networks have a high penetration in many venues globally and Wi-Fi is a standard feature in wireless devices. Hence, Wi-Fi is being used for enabling location based services in many venues.
Brick-and-mortar stores want to bring the online digital experience to their customers in their stores. More and more venues such as retail stores, shopping centers, hotels, airports, etc., are coming up with their own venue or store specific applications to be able to connect with their customers nearby or in store so that they can increase revenues.
For these venue specific applications, the users need to download and install the application on their wireless devices. Venue specific applications require the user to go to an online application distribution center specific to the device. The user either knows the name of the store specific application in advance or searches for it in the application distribution center. The user locates the application in the application distribution center, downloads the application and installs the application on the device. The user may then use the application when in or in proximity to the store.
A number of issues are arising from this scenario. Users are installing hundreds of applications on their devices, applications are often forgotten, and/or due to inconvenience, the applications are not retrieved when the user is at the venue. These issues are known as “application pollution” and cause application fatigue on the devices. It is with respect to these and other considerations that the present improvements have been developed.
The 802.11 standard specifies a common Medium Access Control (MAC) Layer which provides a variety of functions that support the operation of 802.11-based wireless LANs (WLANs). The MAC Layer manages and maintains communications between 802.11 stations (such as between radio network cards (NIC) in a PC or other wireless devices or stations (STA) and access points (APs)) by coordinating access to a shared radio channel and utilizing protocols that enhance communications over a wireless medium.
802.11n introduced 2009, improved maximum single-channel data rate from 54 Mbps of 802.11g to over 100 Mbps. 802.11n also introduced MIMO (multiple input/multiple output), where, according to the standard, up to 4 separate physical transmit and receive antennas carry independent data that is aggregated in a modulation/demodulation process in the transceiver.
The IEEE 802.11ac specification operates in the 5 GHz band and adds channel bandwidths of 80 MHz and 160 MHz with both contiguous and non-contiguous 160 MHz channels for flexible channel assignment. 802.11ac also adds higher order modulation and supports multiple concurrent downlink transmissions (“multi-user MIMO” (MU-MIMO)), which allows transmission to multiple spatial streams to multiple clients simultaneously. By using smart antenna technology, MU-MIMO enables more efficient spectrum use, higher system capacity and reduced latency by supporting up to four simultaneous user transmissions. 802.11ac streamlines the existing transmit beamforming mechanisms which significantly improves coverage, reliability and data rate performance.
IEEE 802.11ax is the successor to 802.11ac and is proposed to increase the efficiency of WLAN networks, especially in high density areas like public hotspots and other dense traffic areas. 802.11ax will also use orthogonal frequency-division multiple access (OFDMA). Related to 802.11ax, the High Efficiency WLAN Study Group (HEW SG) within the IEEE 802.11 working group is considering improvements to spectrum efficiency to enhance system throughput/area in high density scenarios of APs (Access Points) and/or STAs (Stations).